With network development and popularization of high-resolution terminals, a client imposes an increasingly strict requirement on view experience of an online video. In a streaming application, a DASH (Dynamic Adaptive Streaming over HTTP) technology may provide required media data to a user. The DASH technology incorporates a traditional streaming technology and a progressive download technology.
Currently, when a required video bitstream is being provided for a user, firstly, a client detects real-time network bandwidth, and sends the real-time network bandwidth to a server, and then, the server acquires a corresponding bit rate according to the real-time network bandwidth, and provides, for the user, a video bitstream generated by encoding according to the bit rate.
However, when a corresponding bit rate is acquired by using network bandwidth, and a terminal that imposes a relatively loose requirement on image quality of video data is being used, image quality of a video bitstream directly generated by encoding according to the bit rate acquired by using the network bandwidth is relatively high, and a case in which the network bandwidth is wasted exists, thereby leading to low utilization of the network bandwidth.